Article February 14, 1914 Issue

A recent issue contains an address by the Rev. Mr....

Frederick Dixon—Farnham, England

Farnham Herald

A recent issue contains an address by the Rev. Mr.—, on the subject of mental medicines. In the course of this he refers, in a very kindly way, to Christian Science, but he confuses the healing in Christian Science with every other phase of mental healing under the general designation of "suggestion." The subject is so important and so interesting that I am sure you will permit me to refer to his remarks for the purpose of illustrating the difference between what may be termed spiritual healing and what is commonly known as mental healing, and of showing what, in the opinion of Christian Scientists, is the extreme danger of mental suggestion.

Healing by mental suggestion is the claim that it is possible for one person to suggest to another person a belief of health in place of a belief of sickness. The danger of this is that the suggestion, even when it is supposed to be efficacious, is quite commonly not permanent, and is followed by a relapse to an even worse mental and physical condition. This, however, is by no means the worst part of it. If suggestion is a possible thing, it is a claim that one person is able to dominate the mind of another person. The conclusion from this is unavoidable. If it is possible to suggest health, it is also possible to suggest sickness. If it is possible to suggest good, it is as easy to suggest evil, and the human mind, being much more prone to materiality and evil than to spirituality and good, it would necessarily be easier to impregnate the mind with evil than with good. Even supposing that a person who was sick could have that sickness removed by a suggestion of health, nothing would have been done to protect him from another attack of sickness, in the event of its supervening. As a matter of fact, the best that can be said for suggestion is that if it seems to do temporary good, it must inevitably do harm; while the worst that can be said for it is that it claims to give the worker in iniquity power over another person.

All this is really the complete antithesis of Christian Science treatment. Christian Science demands that a man shall be made spiritually better before he can be made physically so. It insists, in short, that a man's physical condition is the result of his mental condition; and that the only way in which he can be healed is by giving him an understanding of the omnipotence of good, which will not only destroy temporary physical disability, but will prepare him to face any future sickness with an understanding of spiritual action, which, as it develops in his consciousness, will enable him to defend himself against sickness and sin in every form. In plain English, it will be seen that the healing of physical disease is only a factor in this view of healing, which aims at healing the human mind from a belief in the reality and power of evil, and so producing a mental condition which will be reflected in harmony of mind and body. In order, then, to make a man whole, you must make him, so far as may be, holy, holy and whole being only different spellings of the same word, brought about in the development of the language.

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